The Duke's Agent

by Rebecca Jenkins

  Jarrett found himself left in the voided room flanked by Jasper Bedlington and the constable.

  ‘The Reverend Prattman, the Justice Prattman, he must be fetched, he must be told; he would never have allowed…’ The innkeeper’s distress was evident. ‘Thaddaeus, what a dreadful thing this is!’ he exclaimed helplessly.

  The constable stretched his head warily out of the door. The crowd was occupied watching the magistrate as he manoeuvred his way down towards the river bed, followed by Nat Broom who slid after him, burdened by Jarrett’s boots.

  ‘In that, Jasper, I would agree with you.’ The constable fixed bashful eyes on the gentleman prisoner. ‘But Mr Jarrett will agree that Justice Raistrick is the magistrate,’ his tone pleaded for understanding, ‘while you and I, Jasper, are but officers of the vestry.’ Nervously he peeped outside once more. ‘A mistake,’ he muttered, as if to reassure himself. ‘It will be proved a mistake.’

  Jarrett gave the man a weary smile. ‘Have no fear, Constable Thaddaeus. It takes at least two magistrates to convict on a charge of murder – and, indeed, as the Duke’s agent I will be satisfied with no less than a trial at the Durham Quarter Sessions.’

  *

  The toll-booth in Woolbridge was a quaint octagonal building set at the mouth of the market. It was a serviceable structure, housing a council chamber above and below an arcade where the dairy women set out their wares on fair days. The open arcade was raised on a dais, reached by a short flight of steps. Behind the dais and sunk below street level was the town lock-up. It was to this place that Raistrick led his prisoner, the crowd of onlookers milling about them. The magistrate stood by while the parish constable, shamefaced, lifted the grate in the stone floor and lowered a wooden ladder into the gloom below.

  ‘Reminds me of a billet I once had in Flanders,’ the prisoner remarked.

  Some of the crowd liked his humour and laughed. The magistrate stepped forward to reclaim their attention.

  ‘There will be an investigation held into the death of Sally Grundy at this place, in the chamber above, tomorrow at eleven o’clock.’ His resonant voice rolled out. ‘Let anyone with matter to the purpose come to give evidence before me at that hour.’ He sketched an exaggerated bow to Jarrett, indicating the hatch. ‘Come, sir, your chamber awaits.’

  Jasper Bedlington made one more attempt to intervene.

  ‘Your honour, can I not house Mr Jarrett at my inn? It is just across the way and Constable Thaddaeus may guard him as well there. This is no place for a gentleman.’

  ‘This is where prisoners are held, is it not?’ Raistrick spoke deliberately. ‘And this man is to be held until I have answers.’ He waved a dismissive hand. ‘Get him below! This has been thirsty work, lads!’ he said to his followers. ‘Let’s go drink!’

  Shepherding several of the front row between his solid arms, the magistrate led the crowd out. Eager at the promise of free ale, few bothered to linger to watch the constable swing the heavy grating shut over the head of the prisoner.

  *

  The arcade fell silent as the parish constable retired to seek the comfort of his brazier. The cellar filled the space under the tollbooth. It had a bare earth floor and what light there was came from a small barred window, just above headheight, at street level.

  So here he was. Raif the Wraith, the toast of the 16th’s Fighting Squadron who had repeatedly eluded capture behind enemy lines, imprisoned by a village demagogue. Some fighting man he. To be manhandled, rolled up so neatly without a peep! He ought to be glad of the darkness to cover his shame. He deserved to be hung, if such a villain could contrive it. Jarrett blew out a slow breath. It was no use berating the shadows. Better harbour up his fury for another occasion when it might do some good.

  He examined his cell. He had known worse. The air was fresh enough; he was the sole occupant, so he did not have to suffer the inconvenience of fellow prisoners, and it was a warm night. There was nothing to do but wait. He crouched down, leaning his back against the stone wall. He needed to settle his mind. He thought of the picture he must make cast in his dungeon. A pretty moral piece. He could call it ‘The Rewards of Folly’. How would he render the shadows about him, had he his paint box with him? He was glad he had left that behind with Tiplady. The loss of his box would have lacerated his heart more than their theft of his few clothes – though he would miss his favourite fishing rod. He leant back against the clammy stone and fought against the wave of impotent anger that thrashed through him. It would be a pleasure to tear every one of them limb from limb. Even the women. They were no women, those harpies that sacked his cottage.

  It was not the loss of his property that angered him. After all, he had spent a good deal of the last couple of years with little more than his horse, weapons, a change of linen and a pot to boil potatoes and coffee in. It was the indignity of the assault. That this should have happened to him on home soil! He shook himself. Get a grip, man! Those shadows – how would one set about composing them? A pink-brown ground to begin with, then an inky indigo dye, perhaps, for the depths furthest from the light, shading in with grey and Vandyke brown to graduate towards the ochre of the shaft of sunlight. Idly he picked up a twig blown in from the street above and set to sketching in the dirt. He could not see the impressions he made. His physical movements were a mere shadowing of the pictures he constructed in his mind. People and scenes of the last few days mixed in his thoughts.

  It all began with James Crotter. All he knew of the man when he first arrived was that he had been the Duke’s trusted agent for over ten years. He needed to know more of Crotter. The dead steward was a mystery, a cipher. The most eloquent witness he had encountered as to Crotter’s character had been his abandoned home. Jarrett thought of that dreary place. The house of a solitary man. What did it tell of its erstwhile occupant? That he lived alone and drank deep. What of that? He thought of the empty bottles lying in the oblong room and how long it might take him to collect as many, were there no servants to carry them away. No. Crotter’s lack of servants was more significant than the solitary drinking. Where had Crotter’s money gone? The house was shabby and the deceased was reported to have left few effects. Yet his legitimate pay would have been at least four hundred pounds a year. If the Duke was an inattentive master, he paid well. And then there would be the fruits of those various petty corruptions to swell his income. Even the few he, Jarrett, had come across so far would add up to a tidy sum, and there were likely to be as many more yet uncovered. Could Crotter’s whole fortune have been sunk in drink, as Duffin would have it?

  The features of Justice Raistrick shaped themselves in the shadows at his feet. He had to be involved somehow, that one. His open hostility could not be explained any other way. It could not arise out of mere pride or misunderstanding. On the basis of his two encounters with the man he was certain that the lawyer was cunning and shrewd. Raistrick was purposefully acting against him to counter some perceived threat. Jarrett straightened his shoulders, his sketching hand idle a moment. At least he knew his enemy – even if he had no clear idea of the reason for their contest.

  Who else in Woolbridge might belong to the enemy camp? Could Raistrick be the ‘he’ behind the two ruffians who attacked him on the road? What if those words he caught by chance referred to the letter he carried to the post? He heard Jasper Bedlington’s voice: ‘Did you get your letter taken to the post, Mr Jarrett?’ And he had drawn it out for the innkeeper to see – had he not? – replying, ‘As you see, I have it still.’ An absurd suspicion! Jarrett rebuked himself for letting his situation corrode his sense. If he had any skill in judging character, Jasper Bedlington was an honest man.

  Then what of this Tallyman? That presence seemed forever lurking in the shadows of this affair. He was an even greater blank than Crotter. Jarrett found his attention drifting back to the face of the man who had seemed to recognise him in Justice Raistrick’s lobby. The problem nagged. He was certain it formed a link in the chain of this mystery. He sketched the
eyes, the solid bone of the face, the massy neck – and suddenly he had it. The two boatmen he had followed to the Three Pots. The one with the shirt slung about his neck. That was the man in Raistrick’s lobby. A man who must have overheard him ask after the Tallyman.

  Sounds came from above. A brisk step was heard, muffled at first, then a penetrating voice. ‘I bless my luck that I never married you, Thaddaeus Bone, to share in the shame of this day. To take part with such a scoundrel as that so-called Justice against a sweet-natured gentleman like Mr Jarrett – why, your own dead mother would rise up and cry you shame!’

  Mistress Polly, it seemed, had arrived to succour her favourite customer.

  ‘Now, Polly.’ The constable’s voice elongated the last syllable of her name in a placating whine.

  ‘Never you Polly me!’ came the sharp return. ‘You let me see him – the poor gentleman!’

  Above, the grating began to move. Accompanied by a mumbled litany of self-exoneration from Constable Thaddaeus, the hatch swung open. The homely, hang-dog face of the constable appeared briefly only to be unceremoniously moved aside. Mrs Bedlington peered down into the gloom. As Jarrett moved into the light she exclaimed, ‘Oh, Mr Jarrett, to see you so! I’m all overcome!’ Gathering up a corner of her apron she dabbed her overflowing eyes.

  ‘Please Mrs B – do not! Not on my account,’ Jarrett stammered, disconcerted. ‘I am quite well and safe. This whole matter will be cleared up in no time, you will see.’

  Mrs Bedlington composed herself with a neat, ladylike sniff. ‘I’ve brought you something to eat, Mr Jarrett. You can’t count on that lump there,’ she crushed Thaddaeus with a withering look, ‘to have the wit to send for nourishment for his poor mistaken prisoners. Fetch the ladder down, Thaddaeus, and let Mr Jarrett come up and eat his supper like the Christian gentleman he is.’

  Here Mrs Bedlington met with a check. All her formidable powers of persuasion could not quite overbalance the constable’s ingrained terror of Justice Raistrick. Despite all her wiles and scolding, he would not allow his prisoner up from his dungeon. Mrs Bedlington’s considerable will battered itself against the rock of Constable Bone’s obstinacy while Jarrett found himself growing hungry. At last Mistress Polly gave in with bad grace and allowed her basket of provisions to be lowered down on a string.

  Jarrett watched the basket, covered with a snow white napkin that caught the light, drop inch by inch, accompanied by Mrs Bedlington’s flowing commentary.

  ‘This is an unlucky night,’ she scolded fate. ‘The vicar’s away till late, preaching for the Bishop – a great compliment, and mighty puffed up he is by it too – and Sir Thomas, they tell me, was seen setting out on the Durham road as if he meant it just yesterday morn. But I’ve sent my Jasper to seek Captain Adams. He’ll know what to do. And you mustn’t fret about your horse, neither, sir, for he is safe in our stables. Take heart, Mr Jarrett, all will be well. There are some in Woolbridge still have their wits about them and they’ll not let this rest. There!’ she pronounced with satisfaction as she watched Jarrett examine the basket’s contents. ‘You eat hearty. Thaddaeus,’ she went on unexpectedly, ‘I’ve brought some of Jasper’s best brew. Let us go aside and have a glass and leave Mr Jarrett to eat in peace.’

  As the pair retreated Mrs Bedlington fixed her eyes on Jarrett’s with a sharp toss of her head that made her curls bounce. He looked behind him puzzled. A bear-like shape formed out of the shadows beyond the street grate and Duffin came to crouch at the bars.

  ‘Now then,’ he said.

  Jarrett greeted him with pleasure. ‘Duffin! Have you come to visit me cast in my dungeon?’

  The poacher threw a familiar look around the sunken room. ‘As I recollect, it’s damp in there. Gets into your bones, it does. Best keep your coat on,’ he advised.

  Jarrett grinned. ‘I am sturdier than I look. So what news? I had an idea you found something up there on the rock.’

  ‘There’s a spot hidden under the trees,’ the man answered in a business-like fashion. ‘Some person set there a while. I’d not swear it were last night, but marks look fresh. Found an imprint, too – of a woman’s clog, or a lad’s maybe. Whoever it were, they’d not have been seen from the rock in the dark. I weren’t going to tell for him to hear,’ he finished, scornfully. Duffin, it seemed, shared Jarrett’s opinion of the magistrate.

  ‘So now we have two people who might have witnessed Sal’s end. The shoe is joined by the clog,’ commented Jarrett, intrigued. He smiled up at the man. ‘And what of that print? Am I unlucky enough to have feet the size of a murderer’s?’

  Duffin returned him a lugubrious, deadpan look. ‘Good thing you’ve smallish feet,’ he said, then grinned. ‘Your boot fair rattled about in that mark. Magistrate would have it that blood had spread soaking into the rock. A print that sharp’s never spread, says I. Besides, the shoe that made that mark’s straight-lasted – such as common folk wear, the same shoe for left and right. Your boots were made for you. Any fool can see you can tell the left from right. Not that he were listening. He likes you for the deed, that’s plain.’

  ‘And did those marks tell you anything?’

  ‘The man who made that stride would be a taller man than you,’ Duffin replied confidently. ‘A thumb’s shy of six foot or near there, I’d swear. And another thing – when he carried her, he got blood on him. It’d have stained his breast and shoulder, the way her head was dripping.’

  Jarrett pondered this new information a moment. ‘Ah, well. We will see what tomorrow will bring. Raistrick cannot investigate alone. He will have to be joined by a second Justice soon.’

  A pallet of boards stood in a corner. Jarrett pulled the bed into the pool of light that fell from the grating. He sat with one leg stretched out and the other crooked up, leaning his chin on his raised knee. The shadows emphasised the vertical creases that marked out his cheeks. Duffin watched him in companionable silence.

  ‘Duffin, you told me the Tallyman was a tall fellow with yellow hair who used to be a sailor, did you not?’

  The poacher lifted grizzled eyebrows and grunted. Jarrett’s shadowed eyes focused beyond the wall. ‘You wouldn’t know if he happens to wear a blue coat?’

  ‘Seen him, have you?’ asked Duffin.

  ‘No. Have you read the handbill from the Justice at Brough concerning the murder of the crofter up on the moor?’

  ‘Canna read.’

  ‘The witness gave the murderer to be a tall, yellow-haired fellow in a blue coat. A man with hair braided up in a tail like a sailor – and he was thought to be pock-marked. You described the Tallyman as cribbage-faced, I think?’

  Silence lay between them.

  ‘How did he die, this crofter?’ ventured Duffin at last.

  ‘The bill did not say – though it seems the victim bled freely.’

  Duffin pulled back his shoulders with an audible click of his bones. ‘Tallyman’s mighty fond of his French knife. Likes that chalking trick of carving a man’s cheek to make his point – never mind slicing a poor dog’s throat,’ he added bitterly.

  Jarrett got up from the boards. He paced a turn or two between the shadows and the grimy light.

  ‘If we were to say – for the sake of argument – that the description contained in the bill I conveyed to Justice Raistrick brings to mind this Tallyman. If this bully has half the reputation you give him, Ezekiel, the magistrate would know of him – surely?’ He stood up on the bed and grasped the bars of the grating, to bring his face closer to the stoic features above him. ‘He does know of him, doesn’t he?’ he asked urgently.

  The poacher’s bear-like outline was silhouetted against the light. It gave an expressive shrug. Jarrett dropped back and rubbed his hands over his face and up through his fair hair, making it stand up in spikes.

  ‘A pretty pickle my eccentricities have led me into,’ he murmured ruefully. Duffin’s snort of agreement drifted down with the evening air.

  In the arcade above, Mrs Bedlington came to the
hatch.

  ‘Mr Jarrett, there are gentlefolk coming down the street!’ she hissed in a stage whisper. Jarrett caught a glimpse of Duffin’s parting nod before the poacher slid away into the darkness as noiselessly as he had come.

  ‘Well, Thaddaeus, I’d best be off,’ Jarrett heard Mrs Bedlington pronounce in a carrying tone. ‘If I leave the place for more than half an hour it turns into a bear garden. Enjoy your meal, Mr Jarrett – and sleep sound. Though if he gets any rest in that pit you’ve thrown him into, Thaddaeus Bone, it’ll be a miracle!’ she added in a crushing aside.

  ‘Bless you, Mrs B. You are a true friend,’ Jarrett called up after her. ‘Please present my compliments to Mr B.’

  ‘God keep you, sir. I’ll be back in the morning with news and your breakfast,’ she responded and departed.

  Sleep did not prove easy. The boards were uncomfortable and the earth floor so damp it was no better alternative. The pieces of the puzzle shifted about, unsettling his mind. The magistrate knew more of the Tallyman than he wished to admit. The Tallyman was a likely suspect as the murderer of the crofter. All at once Jarrett recalled the tension of the boy hunched in Justice Raistrick’s chamber and the muted roar of the caged presence in that inner room. The Tallyman could have been there in that very building while he, Jarrett, waited, an ignorant dupe, to see his master. His frustration at the thought was leavened by the irony of that juxtaposition. If what he speculated was true, then it must have given the magistrate a devil of a shock to have the Duke’s man coming in with that bill in his hand giving the description of his bully as the Stainmoor murderer. Little wonder at his behaviour at their first interview. Jarrett wished he had known at the time how unsettlingly well-informed he must have appeared to the magistrate at that meeting. He would have enjoyed it more.

  Gradually he drifted into sleep. The dark figure of the Tallyman dominated his dreams. He saw him at the old manor house standing over Crotter’s body. The Tallyman taking the books – an errand boy. He thought of her, Black-Eyed Sal. The tall featureless figure in a blue coat and yellow hair was bending over her lifeless body, a bright red halo spreading out from her black hair.